


the echo valley

by vandenburg



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Emetophobia, M/M, Sickfic, i havent written out him coughing, so just assume hes coughing pretty regularly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-12
Updated: 2018-06-12
Packaged: 2019-05-21 10:48:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14913959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vandenburg/pseuds/vandenburg
Summary: Sick from the incessant raining on their way to Shady Creek Run after a job well-done in the Labenda Swamp, Caleb receives some comfort – from Kiri.





	the echo valley

**Author's Note:**

> This was a response to @acepalindrome's post on Tumblr (/post/174768261238/consider-this-one-day-caleb-is-in-an-obviously on their blog) that got way out of hand, so I'm uploading it here, as well as in my reblog of the post.

It’s the third day of rainy weather. Caleb feels as though he will never be dry again. On his chin and neck, an itch has set in that he tries not to indulge; the beginning of a stubble is emerging. Despite Yasha’s good intentions, a shave with a five foot greatsword is not the neatest in all of Wildemount.

Most of the others are quiet. Beau and Fjord talk amongst themselves, each on their own horse, with occasional additions from Jester, the driver of the cart. The rest of the Nein are huddled in the cart itself. Kiri and Nott are snuggled against Yasha, whose giant presence shields them somewhat from the rain. Even from across the cart, Caleb can hear Kiri gently cooing in her sleep.

Mollymauk is the only one who seems to attempt to keep spirits high. He’s whittling on a stick he found on the road, legs dangling off the far end of the cart. It seems like a dangerous hobby to practice on a moving cart, but they all know that if Molly has gotten an idea, it’s very hard to talk him out of it.

In any case, Caleb is not in a condition to talk with anyone.

Wrapped in his tattered coat and body slumped against the side of the cart, he looks more like a sack of potatoes than any human being. His head is swimming, his throat burning, and his nose dribbles persistently. Whenever he can, he sleeps, but he always wakes up tired.

He’s sick.

An illness like this could take his life if he has to spend much more time in the cold rain, but he can’t find the words to ask Jester for help. Does he really  _deserve_  that help? What if she spends a spellslot on him and the group gets in a pickle later on? Will her saving him from nature keep her from saving someone else from bleeding out? What if that someone is Nott? Yasha? Mollymauk? Beauregard? Jester herself? Even Fjord? Or, gods forbid, Kiri?

So… he stays silent and does what he can with his own magic to alleviate the cold.

The fourth time he wakes up from a nap, the cart is bumbling over grass, clearly headed for a cluster of trees a little ways away. The others must have decided its potential shelther outweighs the inconvenience of a slight detour.

Caleb is inclined to agree.

He’s already nodding off again when someone gently shakes his shoulder. Forcing his eyes open, he sees two goblins standing in front of him, both his beloved Nott. She must have learned Duplicity from Jester.

“I’m so proud of you,” he mumbles, self-conscious of how his accent thickens and his voice hoarsens as he speaks.

Both Notts look confusedly down at him, and for a moment, Caleb wonders if he accidentally slipped into Zemnian, but then Nott says accusitorily: “You’re sick!”

That catches the attention of the whole group.

“No, no, no, I’m not sick,” he insists, but is interrupted by a chorus of coughs.

Nott yells: “Jester! Caleb’s sick, heal him!”

Caleb winces and pushes himself further down. The cart sways as Jester climbs into it and approaches him. Her blue hand comes to rest on his forehead. Her fingers are ice cold. A ripple of magic runs through him and for that moment, he feels as though he could easily take on an army. But then Jester lowers her hand, and his body is again claimed by nausea and dizziness.

“I don’t think my healing spell worked,” Jester says, and Caleb nearly weeps at the worry in her voice. It’s hard to believe anyone could really care about him being sick. He hasn’t received this sort of attention since… well, since his mother. “I think it’s like the poison or when you’re drunk, Nott; it’s a condition. I need my healer’s kit.”

“I’m fine,” Caleb insists, even as the cart sways again as someone tries to locate Jester’s tools. “I just need to sleep, that’s all.”

“Because you haven’t had any of that all day,” a sarcastic voice joins them, and Caleb looks up to see Mollymauk lounging nearby. Despite his relaxed body language, Caleb can see tension in his shoulders. The comment may have seemed degrading coming from someone else, but Mollymauk delivers it with such gentle care that it feels more soothing than the brief euphoria from Jester’s spell.

Nott speaks up in his defence, clearly sensitive to any negative comments: “Will you shut up?? Caleb’s  _clearly_  feeling  _awful_ , just  _look_  at him!”

_Vielen Dank, Nott_ , Caleb thinks to himself, wincing at Nott’s loud voice.

“You do look like shit, Caleb,” Jester supplies gently, cold fingertips running over his forehead. He doesn’t look her in the eye, isn’t very good at the whole eye-contact thing in the first place, but he can tell she’s investigating him. “I think you have a fever,” she adds, and,  _ja_ , that would make sense; tieflings run hot, Jester especially, and if  _she_  feels cool to the touch, then he must be burning up.

“Here,” Yasha’s soft voice arrives at the same time as the barbarian as she walks up to the cart and leans up to hand Jester the healer’s kit.

Jester smiles brightly. “Thank you, Yasha. Just give me a second, Caleb, and then you’ll be right as rain,” she promises cheerfully. “Can you lie down? And Nott, you hold his face.”

They do as she asks. Nausea pools in the pit of his stomach and he nearly vomits all over the cart, but luckily he manages to breathe deeply through his mouth, and although it aggravates his throat ache, it alleviates the nausea. Soon, his head is cradled by Nott’s little body.

Bright, yellow eyes stare down at him. The panic and affection flooding those eyes make him dizzy with shame and guilt. Will he ever deserve Nott’s devotion?

“I will be okay,” he whispers to her as he feels Jester unbuttoning his coat and shirt to inspect his chest. The wind is icy against his already-wet skin, while the rain has already done the worst it can do.

Nott just squeezes his ears, talons digging into his soft skin. Clearly, she doesn’t believe him, but she also doesn’t want to fight.

As cold as he is while Jester does her examination, he feels himself drift off. Nott is warm and a little drier than he. He turns his head and buries his nose in Nott’s arm, and then he closes his eyes. Just a little nap while Jester goes about her business, that can’t hurt…

 

***

 

The smell of burnt flesh awakens him. No. The scream is lodged in his throat. He looks up and the cart is on fire. The Nein are nowhere to be seen. Scrambling to his feet, he runs, and he gets to a door, and he opens it, and suddenly he’s in his childhood home, and there are his parents. His father is eating breakfast and his mother is making tea. They look at him, and they smile. So proud. So proud of their only son. But the fire spreads now, and his mother’s hair is on fire, and she keeps smiling, so proud, so proud, and he yells at her but she starts singing a lullaby from his childhood – “ _Guten Abend, gute Nacht, mit Rosen bedacht, mit Näglein besteckt"_  – and now her clothes are on fire and still she keeps singing and he grips a hold of her and he feels her, warm, so warm, and he yells at her to, to, to

 

***

 

“ _Stop, bitte,_ ” he sobs into her clothing. “ _Bitte, hörst auf_ _._ ”

“Caleb.”

“ _Nein, nein, nein, nein, nein_.”

“Caleb!”

That snaps him out of it. Sluggishly, Caleb realizes that he is not with his mother. In fact, he isn’t even standing up. He’s curled up against someone warm, face pressed into their leg, and they’re on some surface that’s on the move. The cart.

His eyes open, and he can see nothing but blackness. Is this it? Has he become blind? Or dead?

“Caleb,” the voice above him croons, and he’s obliged to turn his head and look up at his human pillow.

He sees twinkling jewellery and the very  _very_  faint outline of a pair of horns against the dark night sky.

“You were having a nightmare,” Mollymauk informs him quietly. A soft palm comes down to rest gently on Caleb’s forehead. In spite of the general warmth Caleb feels from Molly, his hand is cold. “We’re on our way to Hupperdook. The others think we will be there in a couple of hours. Jester couldn’t figure out what’s wrong with you, so we’re taking you to a proper physician.”

If they have one. The words are left unsaid. Even though Caleb can’t see Molly’s face, he imagines the words are spelled out on his skin, in invisible ink, like the kind made out of lemon juice, only visible on the parchment when you heat it up. Caleb is supposedly very warm. Perhaps if… Clumsily, he reaches up and touches what he approximates to be Molly’s face. As expected, his skin is cool. He stiffens under Caleb’s touch.

“What are you doing?”

“ _Ich wärme deine Haut… wie Zitronensaft_.”

“Alright, you’re clearly delirious. Please, go back to sleep.”

“Hm…” Caleb pats Molly’s cheek and retracts his hand. “ _Vielleicht später_.”

 

***

 

The next time Caleb comes to, he is distinctly aware that he’s sharing his bed with two small creatures. Groggily, he snaps his fingers to bring forth a third, which gets comfortable against his legs. On one side, her arm slung protectively over his side, even though she can barely reach, is Nott. She’s breathing regularly, but he can feel her crossbow digging into the small of his back. In front of him is Kiri, all floofed up with her beak buried in her feathers. Small cooing noises emerge from her.

He barely manages to shift a little before Nott yells: “Caleb! You’re awake!”

Before he knows it he’s flat on his back and Nott has seized his entire upper body in a crushing hug. Both Kiri and Frumpkin make distressed noises before they find new, comfortable positions.

“ _Was_ – what, what happened?” His throat doesn’t hurt as badly anymore, but there is still a certain itch in there, and his voice sounds broken.

Nott sits up on his chest, legs folded. It seriously interferes with his breathing. “Jester didn’t know what was wrong with you, so we drove here as _fast_  as we could. We found this inn and then the others went looking for a doctor, and the one they brought said you had n… neo… I don’t know, it was something that started with P but didn’t sound like it–”

“Pneumonia?” he supplies, wheezing because of her weight. She looks embarrassed as she drops back down on the bed, but nods enthusiastically.

“You’re  _so smart_! I wish you’d been that smart last night. Do you feel any better?”

“Uh…” He takes a moment to feel. “ _Ja_ , I think so. My throat is better, and I don’t think I have much of a fever anymore.”

“Excellent!” She claps her hands together. “The others are all out exploring the city. Well, except for Kiri; she needs the extra sleep. I’ll go tell them to cook you breakfast!”

Before he can argue that he isn’t hungry and that the nausea has  _definitely_  not gone away, she’s out of the door. Sighing heavily, Caleb tuts for Frumpkin, who happily walks across his stomach to settle down on his chest. He purrs quietly when Caleb pets him.

Suddenly, something starts to purr against his leg. Looking down, he sees Kiri. Her feathers are all floofed up, but she’s awake, and she’s watching him intently. Sadly.

“Do you want Frumpkin?” he asks, not sure if he’s actually prepared to give him away.

But Kiri shakes her head. And then she says, in a voice he doesn’t recognize: “He would have been lost for certain.”

He frowns. “Are you talking about me?”

“Caleb,” Kiri says in Fjord’s deep drawl while nodding.

“Why are you telling me this?”

This time it’s Yasha’s voice: “Worried about him.”

“Worried?” Caleb swallows. “About me?”

Kiri nods.

“Why?”

She cocks her head to the side, as though she doesn’t understand his question.

“Why worry about  _me_?”

She thinks for a second. Then Beau’s voice answers: “Caleb’s strong.” He doesn’t know what to say to that; he just stares at Kiri, who stares right back.

“If anything happens to him, I will shoot every single one of you,” Nott’s voice threatens shakily. “I love him; I  _need_  him.”

“She… she said that?” Caleb asks, unsure of what to say.

Kiri sits up straighter, nods enthusiastically, and smiles broadly. Enthusiastically, she broadcasts a stream of compliments with little pause:

“Look at Caleb’s handwriting, it’s so pretty!” Jester.

“He means well.” Fjord.

“Him being handsome is no well-kept secret.” Mollymauk.

“We all want him to be safe.” Yasha.

“I’m kinda starting to really like the dude.” Beau.

“To be fair, his jokes are  _very_  funny.” Mollymauk.

“But  _Caleb_  is the smartest!” Nott.

“Our charming wizard.” Mollymauk.

“I wish I could’ve healed you myself.” Jester.

“I find his hermit look charming.” Mollymauk.

“Keep him safe.” Mollymauk.

When Kiri finally pauses, Caleb has practically left his physical body, completely overcome by the sheer volume of praise that the Nein apparently must have relayed at some point or other in front of Kiri.

“Do you feel any better?” It’s Nott’s voice from just a few minutes earlier, but this time it’s projected from Kiri’s beak. She looks at him with wide, worried eyes.

He nearly weeps into Frumpkin’s fur. “ _Ja_. Yes. Yes, I feel better.”

Kiri chirps excitedly, and then nestles back down against his waist to go for another nap.

 

***

 

After breakfast, he manages to convince Nott to leave; she has a few errands she wants to run, and Kiri seems curious to inspect this new town, too. It’s not actually morning, it’s more like afternoon at this point, so they will have to go now if they want to get into town before the shops close.

He is left to his own devices. Head swimming, he can’t read or write, so he contents himself with petting Frumpkin and mumble-singing childhood songs to himself. Inevitably, Kiri’s words (that is: the words Kiri spoke to him) return to him.

Caleb is the man who cannot forget. And no matter how much he tries to, he can’t repress the realization that on Kiri’s list of compliments, Mollymauk’s make up almost  _half_. It sits uneasily with Caleb. He can’t quite articulate why.

Perhaps it’s Mollymauk’s big personality: he takes up an entire room with his horns and his sweeping coat and his smell of jasmine. But, no, that’s not it, because Caleb prefers it when Mollymauk struts around like a peacock and soaks in the attention; it allows Caleb to sink into the shadows.

Perhaps it’s the force with which he treats people: he has no scruples about shoving someone against a wall as a means of conversation, and he likes having serious discussions while everyone around him is naked and vulnerable. But, no … no, it may make Caleb nervous, but he prefers not to have to take any initiative himself.

Perhaps it’s the way he thinks about the past: to Mollymauk, the past is something he has no influence over; it’s a land better untrod, and he is perfectly comfortable with never hearing about his. More than anything, this is what Caleb should feel the most outraged over. But he isn’t. He just longs for having the same state of mind, where the past doesn’t define who he is, or where he will go next.

Frumpkin’s purr is better than any Zemnian lullaby.

 

***

 

It’s proper evening the next time he wakes up, and he’s still alone. His stomach growls impatiently; he only managed to swallow half a waffle for breakfast. His bladder, too, is frustrated at this point, and he feels disgusting after marinating in his own sweat and dirty rain all night and day. A bath would do wonders.

Gingerly moving Frumpkin onto the bed, he sits up. The entire world spins, and before he knows it, he’s throwing up onto the floor. Half a waffle, almost completely digested, stares back at him as he dry-heaves. The stink is already unbearable. Gods, he feels pathetic.

He cleans the vomit with a muttered spell, but the stink still hangs in the air when he drags himself off to take a piss in the private latrine. Shedding every layer except what would be socially inappropriate (save his book holster – he keeps that one on), he heads downstairs.

The stairs are torture. Just being on his feet is torture. His legs shake and the world spins and he feels seconds away from vomiting over this entire establishment. But he breathes deeply and steadily, and he takes one step down the staircase.

And nearly loses his balance.

Swearing in Zemnian, he grips onto the bannister with all of his might. The world becomes distant. Fuzzy. A little dark around the edges.

Suddenly, there’s a hand wrapped around his shoulder. Startled by the touch, he draws away from it, but the hand only tightens its grip. The hand is lavender.

“Let me help you with that,” Mollymauk says, and even though he’s clearly going for a cheerful tone, Caleb knows him well enough by now to know it’s an act. “What is it you’re trying to do here?”

“I, um,” he begins, voice rough. “Food. I wanted food.”

Molly looks at him skeptically. “Alright, how about this: I help you back into bed, and then I get you some food?”

Caleb nods.

And instantly throws up over the side of the staircase.

Groggily, he says, “Didn’t think there was anything left in me.”

That’s when he realizes Molly is laughing joyfully and arguing with someone beneath the staircase. Oh.  _Sheiße_ , he must’ve hit someone.

“Come on, darling; you better get away before I have to fight in your honor,” Molly says, voice full of humor, as he leans down to wrap Caleb’s arm over his shoulders and his own arm around Caleb’s waist.

They’re so close, Caleb can smell jasmine.

“Just one stair, you can do it.  _There_  you go. Alright, just a few more steps now. Come on, lean on me, but keep going. There. Well done. Just a little more. There we go. Here, lean against the wall while I shut the door. Excellent. Alright, three steps left. Two. One. Aaand  _there_  we go. All better.”

He nearly throws up over the side of the bed once he finally makes it, but after a few moments of breathing in jasmine, his stomach settles.

“What do you want to eat?” He lets out an involuntary groan, which makes Molly snort. “I’ll think of something. Hang tight.”

 

***

 

The smell of bacon wakes him up. It’s situated on a plate, along with eggs and bread, and next to it is a large glass of water. Plate and glass are on a tray, which Molly is just now carrying to him. “Room service,” Molly says in a sing-song voice, placing the tray on the bedside table to help Caleb out with his pillows so that he can sit, and then gingerly placing it in his lap.

“ _Thank_  you, Mollymauk,” Caleb breathes.

“I would’ve come sooner, but I actually  _did_  have to fight a guy to clean up the mess you made.” His cheerful tone suggests that he didn’t really mind. “So, you owe me one.”

“I owe  _all_  of you,” Caleb muses, mouth half-filled with scrambled eggs.

Molly sits down in the foot of the bed. “We couldn’t lose our wizard,” he teases.

Without thinking, Caleb affirms: “Our  _charming_  wizard,” and continues eating.

There is a moment of silence. “Sure,” Molly says at last.

In the end, Caleb can’t eat much more than he could at breakfast, but it’s better than nothing. Molly returns the tray downstairs, and Caleb assumes he’ll stay down there, but a few minutes later, Molly comes back and settles on the other bed in the room.

Not only that, but he produces  _Tusk Love_  from inside his coat and seems content to sit and read.

A realization dawns on Caleb. “Nott sent you.”

Molly looks up. “What’s that, dear? I was just reading about Oskar’s ‘proud, gleaming tusks’.”

“Nott sent you. To look after me.”

“Don’t you think you’re being –”

“How long have you been downstairs?”

Molly clears his throat awkwardly and lowers his eyes to look back at his book. Embarrassment is not a common color on Molly, and Caleb enjoys seeing it. “Just a few hours.”

“A few hours…”

“Nott is just worried about you,” Molly says. “We’re  _all_  worried about you. I volunteered to go, if that helps.”

_Keep him safe_. The words circulate through Caleb’s mind, over and over.  _Keep him safe_. Those words he would’ve expected to come from Nott, but which in actuality had come from the man across from him.

“Why didn’t you come upstairs?”

“I wanted to give you some space. I knew you weren’t in mortal danger anymore, and I figured you’d attempt to come downstairs sooner or later, when you were ready to be disturbed.”

That’s … uncomfortably thoughtful of Molly. Caleb isn’t used to people knowing he needs space and people then  _giving_  it to him.

Molly gives him a strange look. Putting away  _Tusk Love_ , he leans across his crossed legs. “Do you have any memory of last night?”

Caleb is the man who doesn’t forget. But the fever must have played a trick on his brain, because what he  _can_  remember is quite frankly impossible. 

“No.”

Molly’s soft voice promising him it’s just a nightmare; whispered Zemnian; the soft, cool skin of Molly’s cheek…

“Oh.” Molly picks up his book again and leans back against the wall. “Interesting.”

“Why?”

Molly doesn’t look up. “Oh, nothing; you just talked a bit in your sleep, that’s all. I couldn’t understand it, of course; it was all in Zemnian. I was just wondering what it meant.”

_I’m warming your skin… like lemon juice._

“Oh. Okay.”

 

***

 

When the others come back, they barge right into Caleb’s room.

Both he and Molly are startled, Molly with a hand under his head as he finishes the last twenty pages of the book, and Caleb with his thoughts elsewhere and his hand on Frumpkin.

Leading the group are Nott and Kiri, who both march towards Caleb. Unexpectedly, Kiri is the one to get the first word: “I love him!” she yells in Nott’s voice, and then she jumps up into the bed.

While the rest of the room is startled, Caleb just awkwardly pats Kiri on her head and says, “Thank you, Kiri, I am much better,” and she chirps back happily.

“Did Kiri just say she loved him using Nott’s whole–”

“Not now, Beau.”

“Ohmygosh, Kiri!!” Jester’s shrill voice rises above them all. “That was so cute!!”

“Yes, I am very sweet!” Kiri responds, practically jumping from glee.

This is all… a little too much. Caleb lies back down and tries to become much smaller in the bed. Perhaps they’ll forget he’s here.

Their voices intermingle and it’s all just so  _loud_ and he knows it would be rude to ask them to quiet down because they’re only loud because they’re excited that he’s doing better, but if they don’t lower their voices soon he will tear off his ears and–

“Can we  _please_ get some peace and quiet in here?” Mollymauk says, voice cutting through the chaos. “This is a sick room; the tavern is downstairs.”

Yasha, Fjord, and Beau exit with a few mumbled (and awkward in the cases of Yasha and Beau) apologies, while Jester says to Kiri, “I don’t know if you should go down to the tavern with us; you  _are_  just a baby.”

“She doesn’t have to actually drink to be there,” Molly points out, “and I was just about to read some paragraphs of  _Tusk Love_  out loud, so…”

Jester snorts. “Okay, Kiri, no bedtime story for you. Come on.”

“Take me too, please,” Nott says with a grimace. “You’re alright Caleb, right?”

Caleb quirks his lip into the best semblance of a smile that he can find. “I’m good.”

“Alright,” and with that, the last three members of the Mighty Nein leave the room.

Mollymauk seemingly returns to his book, but Caleb can tell that his eyes don’t follow the lines of the text. It looks like he’s trying to think of something to say – or, perhaps, gather the courage to say something. But Molly is brave. Yes, many things can be said about this purple tiefling wrapped in iconography of gods he most certainly does not believe in, and pierced with jewellery that makes him both look gaudy and expensive, like a piece of art encrusted with gemstones only for the monetary value. But it cannot be said that he is a coward.

“You didn’t seem much surprised by what Kiri said – or, you know, repeated.”

Of course. Everything is about their little bird friend these days. Not that Caleb minds; he’s more disappointed in himself for not realizing it earlier. “When I woke up, she repeated a great many things. That was one of them.”

_Tusk Love_ , the poor thing, is ignored once more. Sprawling on his side, at an angle at which gravity pulls at his shirt to such an effect that he might as well be shirtless, Mollymauk looks over at him, a calculating look in his eye. “What else did she say?”

_Him being handsome is no well-kept secret. To be fair, his jokes are_ very _funny. Our charming wizard. I find his hermit look charming. Keep him safe._

Caleb remembers every word mimicked to him in Mollymauk’s voice. He wets his lips. “Whatever she thought might cheer me up. Compliments and that sort of thing.”

“Well, that was very sweet of her.”

“Yes, I hear that she is very sweet,” Caleb jokes weakly but is blessed with a little smile.

When he doesn’t offer any more details, Mollymauk returns to his book, this time reading for real. Caleb observes him quietly, wondering if he should say anything. On the one hand, he want to confront Molly and ask him not to say those kinds of things – that Molly might enjoy playing these sort of games, but that he can play them with someone else, because Caleb has a mission – but on the other… on the other, he selfishly likes the idea of being…  _admired_. Even if it is just a game, he hasn’t let himself have any kind of fun for eleven years.

Feeling at the five o’clock shadow on his chin, he reminds himself of the battle against the merrows a few days ago. Of how the Dodecahedron turned back time in a moment of dire need. Of how he realized it was treated like a gemstone; worked on by human or humanoid hands until it had become what it is, not a natural phenomenon on its own, but a part of a process – a small product from a  _source_. Of how justice is oh so close to realization, if he can just follow the trail he has been given.

In the candlelit room, in an inn whose outsides he has still not yet seen, Caleb Widogast brings out his books and ink to note his latest theories about the origin of and potential use for the Dodecahedron.

 


End file.
